I first became aware of the passage of time when I was in the first grade.  I suppose that before then there were no milestones to mark the passage of time, so I was unaware.  But that school year provided a milestone, and those nine months of the first grade were really, really long.

Subsequent years went by a little quicker, each a little faster than the one before.  My observation as an older man is that the phenomenon has continued unabated.  The first five months of the year 2021 have gone by like a flash.

The Lord has said that He would hasten the work in its time.  I believe that He has also hastened time itself.

The implication and grand effect of this whole thing is that in another blink of an eye the Second Coming of the Lord Jesus Christ is going to be here.

What does this mean for us?

It means that there is a whole list of absolutely stunning effects that living at this time has upon those now alive.  This is a stunning time.

For instance, you went to the kitchen sink this morning, turned on the water, and got yourself a drink of cool, clear, pure water.  You did it without a thought of what an amazing thing that was.  You take it for granted that the water is there because it always has been there for you.

But it hasn't always been that way.  Plumbing and running water are recent innovations.  My great, great grandparents passed through this uninhabited valley 168 years ago on the Oregon Trail on their way to western Washington and western Oregon.  No white men lived here then.  My grandparents built a cabin to live in, and it didn't have running water.  They had to carry water from the creek.

Kings' palaces didn't have running water, either.  Neither do homes in many parts of the world even today.  Nor do they have indoor plumbing.  In Africa, if you are a girl or a woman, it might be your job every day to walk five miles to the water source, and to carry home a container full of water on your head.  And you might have to let it set awhile before using it so that the silt and sediment can settle out.

Six years ago my wife and I returned from our mission to Vanuatu in the South Seas.  Most of the people there are without indoor plumbing and running water.  Their morning shower is cold water from a hose.

That African girl who carries the family's water home in a pot on her head doesn't even know what a shower is.  Her water is so precious that it has to be used sparingly.  Her bath is just a wipe-down with a damp cloth.

Why are you so lucky?  And why do you take your warm morning shower for granted?  No king ever had life so good as you do.

No king was ever able to enter a dark room and flip a switch to provide instant light.  No king was ever able to jump in a car and be across town or across his country in a matter of minutes or hours.

I live 33 miles from where I'm standing and speaking to you.  I allowed 45 minutes for the trip.  My great, great grandparents, who came through here on the Oregon Trail in 1853 made that identical journey.  It took them three or four days.  Back then there wasn't a freeway going through Ladd Canyon.  They couldn't even negotiate that rough canyon at all.  They had to go up and over the high hills.  At the top of the hill each wagon had to rein in their oxen. stop, and chop down a pine tree.  The limbs were then chopped off, leaving foot-long stubs.  The log was then tied onto the back of the wagon to act as an anchor.  The stubs of the limbs dug into the ground as the wagon drug the log down the hill, and kept the wagon from over-running the oxen.

When I was a little boy I vaguely remember a big pile of logs at the base of the hill just east of the freeway rest stop.  Every wagon that came over the Oregon Trail had to have one of those log anchors.  They dropped those thousands of logs there when they reached the bottom of the hill.  They then proceeded across this beautiful, empty, uninhabited valley as they prepared to cross the Blue Mountains, their next big hurdle.

The first wagon train came through here in 1843.  Those pioneers had to cut a roadway through the forest in the Blue Mountains.  The men went out in front of the wagons with their axes and cut down the trees.

And would you believe it:  there were lazy men and freeloaders even back then.  Some of the men put themselves in the back of the train and wouldn't help!

When you're chopping down a tree with an ax you can't chop it off level with the ground.  You have to leave a stump that is a foot or more high.  Can you see the roadway those men made for the wagons?  It's a pathway of stumps through the forest.  The wheels of the wagons climbed up on the stumps and then came down with a bone-jarring "whump."  Everyone but the driver of the wagon preferred to walk.

The next time you're speeding along the freeway at 70 miles per hour going to Baker, look to your left and imagine those 1-mile per hour oxen pulling their log anchors down that steep hill.

The next time you're speeding along the freeway at 70 miles per hour going to Pendleton imagine that same roadway with its foot-high stumps that you don't have to drive over.

And then ask yourself, "Why me?  Why do I get to live in a time when there is running water, indoor plumbing, warm showers, central heating, electricity, cell phones, cars, airplanes, books, multiple scriptures, living prophets, temples, affluence, education, and limitless opportunity?"

Why me?  Why you?

As a patriarch I've learned something very striking.  A young person comes to me for a patriarchal blessing; and as he or she leaves, I think to myself, "I must remember this person.  This is one of the Lord's chosen!"  I'm awestruck by what I see and feel in that person.

But then the next one is just the same, and the next, and the next, and everyone gets jumbled up in my mind.  What I've learned is that this generation is special.  You are the ones who were on the front line during the war in heaven.  You were the ones who opened your mouths and stood up for the Savior.  You were the ones whom the Lord knows will do it again.  You have been held back and reserved to come to earth to prepare it for the Second Coming of Christ.  It would be a time when every advantage would be yours.  It would be a time when the gospel would be available in its fulness, when prophets would lead us, and when temples would dot the earth.

It would also be a time when temptations and troubles would be their worst.  It would be a time when Satan would be at his very worst after many thousands of years of practice.

Ask yourself, "Why me?"

It's because the Lord knows you and your capacity.  He knows your strength.  He knows your spirit.  He knows you can do it.  He intends for you to be safe and happy and successful through these difficult times--and you will be, it you'll just be good and be diligent.

You think that you're just an ordinary nobody, but I'm here to tell you that isn't so.  You're special, and don't forget it.

And start acting like it!  For heaven's sake, put your cell phone away while you're in seminary and at church.  Can anything else in the world possibly be more important than learning the gospel and learning your duty and preparing to become the parents and leaders of tomorrow?

The Lord is depending on you.  He's counting on you.  Don't let Him and your posterity down.  They're counting on you, too.

And what about those great, great grandparents with whom you made promises that if they'd come early to prepare the way when there wasn't running water and electricity and when everything was hard, that you'd come later and see to it that they would receive their temple ordinances?

They're counting on you, too.  In fact, they're praying for you.  Imagine that.  They know you, and they know what  you're doing.  Joseph Smith said, "They are not far from us, and know and understand our thoughts, feelings, and motions, and are often pained therewith."  (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pg. 326).

I can just see them being disgusted with their great, great grandson sitting there in seminary class looking at his cell phone instead of listening to the instructor.  "They know and understand our thoughts, feelings, and motions and are often pained therewith."

I often reflect on that.  My mind says, "I can't think these thoughts because Grandfather McCornack knows what I'm thinking.  He'd be ashamed, and I should be, too."

This is a stunning time.  All of the world's history has been building to and pointing toward this time--and you get to be here.  Things are happening that have never happened before.

That longest of chapters in the Book of Mormon, Jacob chapter 5, has you in it.  The Lord of the vineyard tells His servant, the prophet, to go and call laborers to help prune the vineyard for the last time.

"And it came to pass that the Lord of the vineyard sent his servant; and the servant went and did as the Lord had commanded him, and brought other servants; and they were few."  (Jacob 5:70).

Never mind that they are a missionary force numbering from 68- to 88-thousand.  They are few in comparison to the work that has to be done in preparation for the Second Coming; but take note, and take heart, from what verse 72 says:  "And the Lord of the vineyard labored also with them."  A missionary force like this has never before happened in the history of the world, and the Lord Himself will be laboring with you when you join that force.

I can testify that the Lord does, indeed, labor with the missionaries.  As a missionary I would leave the house with two objectives in mind that I needed to accomplish that day.  Person after person who needed help, and situation after situation that needed straightening out, would be placed in my way.  Many was the day that I tried to count the number of people and situations that I helped that day, but I'd always lose track around 24.  I'd be gone all day, and would come home exhausted, but with a huge feeling of happiness and satisfaction as I'd recognize the Lord's hand in placing all of those people in my path.  He knew He could count on me, and He used me.  There was nothing like that feeling.

 

Jacob chapter 5 is a nutshell history of the world and of the House of Israel.  It is a masterpiece.  It is 77 verses long, and we're currently at the beginning of verse 74.

This is a stunning time.  Things are happening that have never happened before.

When I joined the Church 54 years ago I was the 2 1/2-millionth member.  There were only 13 temples in the whole world.  Today there are 17 million members, and 252 temples either operating or announced.  In another minute there will be thousands

This is a stunning time.  Things are happening that have never happened before.

I've never heard anyone mention this before, but I consider it highly likely that many of you won't be having funerals.  In fact, if I can hold on long enough, maybe I won't have one, either.  The Lord's Second Coming is close.  The wicked will be destroyed.  The righteous will be preserved, and will live to the age of a tree.  They'll then eventually be changed in the twinkling of an eye from mortality to resurrected beings.  There won't be funerals because their bodies won't spend any time in the ground.

This is a stunning time.  Things are happening that have never happened before.

In 1454 we got the printing press.  We already had the Bible, but few copies existed because they could only be had through copying the Bible by hand.

In 1830 the world got a second book of scripture, The Book of Mormon, Another Testament of Jesus Christ.  That was followed by the Doctrine and Covenants, and The Pearl of Great Price.  We have four books of scripture!

The Children of Israel didn't even have one.  No wonder they had such trouble staying on the straight and narrow.

The Pilgrims and our founding fathers only had one book of scripture.  Other Christian denominations still only have one book.  No wonder they're so confused.  No wonder there's so much fighting and contention.

Stay tuned.  We'll soon have the records of the 10 lost tribes, the writings of Joseph who was sold into Egypt, and a multitude of other books.  We'll have the other two-thirds of the writings that were on Moroni's gold plates.  We'll have the Brass Plates that anchored Lehi and Nephi to the Savior's gospel.

I'm dying to have access to these records, but I don't think we can have them until we know and use what we have.

I hope you are all spending some daily time in the Book of Mormon like prophet after prophet has urged us to do.  If you are, it's a foregone conclusion that you won't go astray or fall into inactivity.

It's a mystery to me how anyone could fall out of the Church.  The only possible answer to that is that they weren't in far enough.

Brothers and sisters, this Church is true!  This restored gospel is the most exciting thing in the world.  We're the ones who have the privilege of bringing things to their long-prophesied conclusion.  We get to gather Israel.  We get to provide temple ordinances for all of our ancestors.  We get to raise our children in light and truth and happiness.  Not one of your posterity will go astray if you prepare now, and do what the prophets have told you to do.

You're the most blessed generation that has ever been sent to earth.

So straighten up, and live for it!  Be what you're supposed to be, and be grateful for your blessings.